What oil do you use and why?

I have been a BITOG member for years and the similarities between discussions of oil and discussions here of wax generally go pretty much the same way. My point is that I trust my years of used oil analysis on Mobil 1 to tell me that it is performing as advertised vs speculation that Mobil is lying about the contents of its oil. My latest UOA was on Mobil 1 EP 5W-30 at 7500 miles. I still had a TBN of 3.0 which in my experience tells me I could have easily gotten to 10K without any troubles and adequate anti-wear additives left over. Fact is though I don't trust the oil filter to go that long which is the only reason I generally change at 7500.



I will be doing another UOA next month on the oil currently in the Mustang which is Mobil 1 Racing 0W-30 (unfortunately discontinued). I will post my results then if you are interested...



Fact is if you are doing 3K-5K oil changes ALL of this discussion isn't worth @#$@# because any cheap conventional oil WalMart happens to have on sale will go to 5K easily.



I have to run, gotta pick up my new Crack... oops I mean Blackberry from Sprint and get my son's paintball tanks filled. Be back later....



Bob
 
rjstaaf said:
Fact is if you are doing 3K-5K oil changes ALL of this discussion isn't worth @#$@# because any cheap conventional oil WalMart happens to have on sale will go to 5K easily.



Bob
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I couldn't agree more Bob. I see people that still swear by the 3K mile oil changes. Hell, some people change it even earlier. With today's oils, I can't imagine doing anything less than 5K mile intervals.
 
Yeah, I really don't get too wound up about the M1 because I'm doing regular changes and I don't put so many miles on my cars that using a more expensive oil is an economic burden...it's just the principle of the thing!
 
JonP said:
I use Purple motor oil because I like the cool purple color bottles they come in. :laugh:

Actually I felt a slight power improvement and better MPG from the OEM oil when switched to full synthetic.
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Not sure if you were joking or not but I, too, use Royal Purple (10w30 in the winter, 10w40 in the summer) and definately noticed a slight power improvement throughout the powerband, and an increase in fuel economy, as well as longevity of the oil between changes.



To the OP: When you do your change, you could pick up a magnetized drain plug and gasket; prolongs the life of the oil filter and extra insurance against small metal particles getting where they should not be.



And also to add, the last duration of RP lasted me 8k miles, and the oil had barely turned brown, and be sure to note that this is on a turbocharged car (excessive heat).
 
rjstaaf said:
Fact is if you are doing 3K-5K oil changes ALL of this discussion isn't worth @#$@# because any cheap conventional oil WalMart happens to have on sale will go to 5K easily.
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I'm not convinced this is true. I'd been using Mobil 1 products for years, with excellent results. My old Pathfinder had 215K on it when I traded it, and was clean as a whistle inside. Compression, power and economy were the same as the day I got it (at 68K). Both my current cars have over 174K on them, and I've used M1 exclusively with 10K oil change intervals until recently. Both engines are varnished up inside. I broke a timing chain at 164K in my VW. That's what got me looking at BITOG. I did an Auto-RX treatment using Rotella T 5W40, but now I'm experimenting with different oils and sending samples to Blackstone. The more I read BITOG the more confused I get; it's information overload I'm afraid.



I think the engines in my garage today are harder on oil than what I'd owned in the past. Some of the new direct injection engines are much tougher still. My VW sees 6000 rpm every day. It will take a lot of oil analysis before I'm comfortable exceeding 5K OCI with a synthetic.
 
the consensus on the jeep forums is it pretty much the best for the 4.0 so I have high hopes. I was just looking around on the shell forums and it seems they have a new version out but the only thing changed is it no longer carries an sj rating and not for use with 07' up diesel's because it has more zinc and phosphorous than the new certification allows. which is still great for the jeep:xyxthumbs
 
The general consensus at BITOG is that there is no "bad" API SM oil for regular use (no super high/low operation, racing, etc). The specs require a good oil. It is just about personal brand preference. Every brand has loyal and satisfied users.
 
Bunky said:
The general consensus at BITOG is that there is no "bad" API SM oil for regular use (no super high/low operation, racing, etc). The specs require a good oil. It is just about personal brand preference. Every brand has loyal and satisfied users.
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couldn't agree more.:bow
 
rjstaaf said:
I also run Mobil 1 Racing oil
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Where do you find that? This may be good for my IT car but I have never come across M1 labelled as racing oil.



reaper34 said:
do you like the rotella? thats what I'll be switching to.
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I've heard a lot of good things about it but so far I've only used it for Auto-RX treatments. I have a sample from the rinse phase of my VW but haven't sent it to Blackstone yet. I'm not sure there's a point, with all the dirt that should have rinsed out.



rjstaaf said:
I have been running Mobil 1 in my vehicles for 20 years with great results backed up by many years of used oil analysis. The Mustang has never seen anything but Mobil 1 and she is still purring like a kitten at 105K...
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I, too, have had great luck with M1 in the past. Both my current (road going) engines are all varnished up now on M1 0W40. At a minimum I'm reducing OCIs but probably changing oil, just haven't decided yet. Possibly German Castrol in the winter and M1 TDT in the summer. At 105K your Mustang is a low mileage car. ;)
 
I currently have RLI Biosyn(vegetable oil) in my SRT8. All my driving is in town and it shows great resistance to fuel dilution in analysys on BITOG and other forums.
 
I use BMW full synthetic 5w30. I have used this for 8 years in all my cars. Why? I get it CHEAP lol and it workds great. It is just rebottled Castrol of Germany oil. If I had to pay full price for oil I would probably still use this or try Royal Purple
 
Setec Astronomy said:
I use Mobil 1 because I like to pay full synthetic price for an oil that's not really really a full synthetic anymore.
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Setec do you experience any oil burnoff with it in the rsx? All I do see is posts on crsx with people getting terrible oil burnoff with M1 on their rsx.



I've been using Mobil Clean 5000, and it seems fine to me. Autozone usually has good deals on it 5 quarts + oil filter for about $10-12. I really don't think my driving habits and mileage warrants a synthetic oil. As long as I change it out every 6 months I think I'm OK.
 
Johnny, last crankcase full was mostly 0W-20 SL that I had bought up when they discontinued it, with a quart of 5W-20 SM. I was 2/3 of a qt. down when I changed it at 5K.



In the old days my GM's used to burn about a half quart of 5W-30 every 3000 miles.



EDIT: Interestingly enough, I've just recently gotten so anal I started writing down the oil level at the time I change it (if I remember) on all the cars I do, just so I can monitor any changes in consumption and/or predict when oil will need to be added. Must be the extra time I have from not going to nightclubs anymore.
 
I used to run Castrol GTX for a long time, but now I only use Mobil1, even though it's been getting a bad rap lately. I have been thinking about going to Syntec or Penzoil Platinum.
 
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